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PIPING AND PANNING 



BY 
EDWIN MEADE ROBINSON 

["TED ROBINSON"] 



W 



NEW YORK 

HARCOURT. BRACE AND HOWE 
1920 







.c<^' 



COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY 
HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, INC. 



THI OUINN ft BODEN COMPAHV 
RAHWAV. N. J. 



5EP 21 1920 
iCI,A597467 



>o. / 



SECRETS OF SONG 

When Homer smote the instrmnent 

Which KipUng, in a verse satiric, 
Miscalled a lyre (in which event, 

His epic zvould have been a lyric); 
But few were found who would devote 

Attention to Achilles' anger, 
When Homer smote — whate'er he smote — 

With tuneful clangor. 

Through seven towns he begged his bread, 

And each disdained his deathless ditty; 
Silt each, as soon as he zvas dead. 

Laid claim to be his native city. 
O Smyrna, Rhodos, Colophon, 

Salamis, Argos, Athens, Chios! 
What higher fame ye might have won 

By being pious! 

Let us, enlightened, try to give 
A different ending to the story; 

Claim we our Homers ivhile they live, 
And zvhen they die, we'll share their glory. 

O, treat no ivandering bard zuith scorn. 
The bread ye give is heavenly manna — 



(The writer of these lines was bom 
In Indiana.) 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

To A Lady 3 

The Lecture 4 

The Story of Ug 6 

LiMERiciSED Classics 8 

Halcyon Days 10 

A Disagreeable Feature 12 

Things I Despise 14 

Things I Like 16 

Rhyme Poverty 18 

You Can't Escape It 19 

Some Anglicisms 21 

The Drawbacks of Humor 22 

Lines to a Small Person 23 

Love Lyrics 25 

Idle Reflections 27 

Youth and Sorrow 29 

History 30 

Puzzled 32 

Longing 33 

A Plaint 35 

Uncongenial • • • 37 

Making Mystery 39 

How He Turned Out 41 

The Auctioneer 43 

" Eleven Million Words Frequently Mis- 
pronounced " 45 

Vale! 48 

We Olympians 49 

An Old Fable 5^ 

V 



vi Contents 



PAGE 

The Question Settled 53 

Affections 54 

To Order 56 

The Woes of Youth 58 

The Critic's Apology . • 60 

A Vain Longing 61 

The Last Frontier 63 

With Us 65 

The Plaint of Apollos 67 

Punchinello 69 

It Happens Often 71 

Mental Pabulum 72 

A Sad Thought 74 

" Our Sweetest Songs " 76 

The Mystery 78 

In Various Keys 79 

"The Balboa" (1915) 81 

The Typewriter's Song 82 

Rural Delights 84 

Why? 86 

A Song of the Movie Mexican .... 89 

The Sailing of the Mayflower . . . 90 

Mysterious Creatures 92 

The Shady Past 94 

ViLLANELLE OF A ViLLANESS 96 

The New Era 97 

Lyric Made in Hot Weather .... 98 

Two Souls 99 

Sundry Reflections 100 

Old Stuff loi 

A Vagary 102 

Liars 104 

A Lay of Ancient Rome 105 

The Age of Genius 107 

Limitations (1917) 108 



Contents vii 



PAGE 

Butter and Eggs no 

A Horrible Experience 112 

Ballade of a Backslider 114 

The Wrong Dope 116 

RoMANZA 118 

An Ambition (1917) 120 

The Old Love 122 

The Uses of Adversity 123 

Conservatives 125 

What Happened 126 

Thoughts Inspired by an Organ Grinder's 

Monkey 127- 

The Truth of It 129 

The Average Man 130 

Sad September Sentiments 132 

Being Inspired i34 

Reflections i35 

The cover design is by C. Bertram Hartman. 



PIPING AND PANNING 



^ 
^ 

^ A 



TO A LADY 

Who Leans over My Shoulder as I Endeavor to Write Verses. 

My pen is on the paper, and a song is in my mind, 
But it never will be written while you stand so close 

behind ; 
The pen has got the palsy, and the song is in the air — 
I wish you would be seated in a comfortable chair ! 

Your eyes upon the new-born lines are burning them 

to death; 
The rhyme's intoxicated with the fragrance of your 

breath ; 
The rhythm's tangled in your hair, the meter is a 

wreck — 
I wish you'd take your lips a greater distance from 

my neck! 

Your hand is on my shoulder, but it's plucking at my 

heart; 
Proximity like this disturbs both rectitude and art. 
I cannot see you, but I know you're close enough to 

kiss — 
I wish you'd go and read a book till I have finished 

this! 

I wish your chin was not so round, I wish your brow 

was brown. 
If you don't go and take a walk till I have settled 

down, 
I'll cease to be the anchorite the world considers me, 
And you'll never be the angel God intended you to be I 

3 



Piping and Panning 



THE LECTURE 

I cannot seem to get the pith 
Of this new bug of Katy's ; 

She wants to hear Professor Smith, 
Who talks on Mithridates — 

While I would spend the evening with 
My Lares and Penates. 

I've grown domestic in my taste, 
As years have brought a measure 

Of calm. Of late I have not chased 
Vague Culture's doubtful treasure; 

And as for lectures — what a waste 
Of comfortable leisure ! 

I did not plead a headache (for 
Your head will not protect your 

Unworthy brain from Culture's lore ;) 
I had to hear that lecture. 

I think it was on Shakespeare, or 
Pre-Gothic Architecture. 

I heard him speak of Caesar's laws, 
The Forum and the Tiber ; 

I think that he described the flaws 
In Nero's moral fiber; 

And I should judge from the applause 
That he was some describer. 



Piping and Panning 



But Katy wouldn't let me hear 

The intellectual brother; 
She whispered softly in my ear 

Of this and that and t'other — 
How " that was Clara Vere de Vere, 

With Jennie Johnson's mother." 

He said " The pipes of Pan are dumb ! " 

But Katy wasn't very; 
He spoke of the millennium, 

And she of millinery. 
Among her neighbors' hats were " some 

The board of health should bury ! " 

I, soothed by his mellifluous tone, 

Was gaping like a gaby. 
When she, who feared I'd pull a bone 

By candid snoring, maybe. 
Made me go out and telephone 

The nurse about the baby. 

When all was o'er, she raved about 

The lecture, and averred it 
Was wonderful; and I've no doubt 

It was, since she preferred it. 
But why should she have dragged me out ?- 

We neither of us heard it! 



Piping and Panning 



THE STORY OF UG 

Ug was a hairy but painstaking artist, 

Back in a simple and primitive age. 
Listen, young Poet! And ere thou departest, 

Haply thou'lt learn something. (Haply thou'lt 
rage!) 
Ug fashioned arrowheads, slowly and neatly. 

Chipping all day at the hardest of stone; 
Made them symmetrical, polished them sweetly. 

Sharpened their points with a skill all his own. 

Long ones and short ones and fat ones or narrow. 

Bolts of obsidian, spearheads of flint ; 
Some that could crash through a mastodon's marrow, 

Some that were prized for their beautiful tint ; 
Endless varieties told of his talents — 

All were alike in that all were acute, 
All had the symmetry, finish and balance 

Arrows must have if one wants them to shoot. 

And then, one day, 

Ug began to notice 

A distinct falling off in his trade, 

And, upon inquiry, he found 

That a new school of arrowhead-makers 

Who made what they called " Free Arrowheads " 

Was getting popular among the young men. 

The arrowheads were " free " 



Piping and Panning 



In the sense that they had no shape, 

Being mere amorphous chunks 

Of flint, or sandstone or blue mud 

Or any thing. 

It seems that the old, shapely kind 

Was felt to be monotonous and antique, 

Being even on both sides, 

Like a foolish old Grecian jar, 

Or a butterfly, or a woman. 

While the new kind 

Could " express the soul " of its maker. 

In looking like a piece of cheese. 

You couldn't hit anything with the new kind 

Because they wouldn't shoot straight ; 

But being purely " subjective " arrowheads, 

They weren't intended to hit anything. 

So Ug was neglected. 

Until people began to get hungry . . . 

And then, since he was the only 

Skilled maker left in the country 

He became 

A millionaire. 



Piping and Panning 



LIMERICISED CLASSICS 

Anthony VV. Euzver, in " The Limeratory," deplores the 
fact that our greatest poets did not make use of the Limerick 
form of verse. We endeavor to supply the omission, tn part. 

I — HOW HOMER SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN THE ILIAD 

There was a young man named Achilles 
Whose wrongs always gave him the willies ; 

So he sulked in his tent 

Like a half-witted gent — 
Say, wasn't them heroes the sillies! 

II — SHAKESPEARE MIGHT HAVE BOILED OTHELLO 

There once was a guy named Othello, 
A dark, disagreeable fellow ; 

After croaking his wife, 

Then he took his own life — 
That bird wasn't black, he was yellow ! 

Ill — THE RUBAIYAT 

"A jug and a book and a dame. 

And a nice shady nook for the same," 

Said Omar Khayyam, 

" And I don't give a dam 
What you say, it's great little game ! " 

IV — " TO LUCASTA, ON GOING TO THE WARS " 

" Lucasta," said Terence O'Connor, 
*' I'm drafted — I guess I'm a goner! 



Piping and Panning 



I know it will grieve you 
To death, when I leave you — 
But gosh ! how I'm stuck on my honor ! " 

V — SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY 

I dropped my wad 

Cornering cotton. Then 

I died. 

Now, I guess I'm forgotten. 

Well, that swell 

Epitaph that I've got 

Makes me laugh. 

When I lived 

I was certainly rotten ! 



10 Piping and Panning 



HALCYON DAYS 

Ere yet the giants of modern science had gone a-slum- 

ming in smelly slums, 
And through the Ghettos and lazarettos had put in 

plumbing (and pulled out plums!) 
When wily wizards in inky vizards employed their 

talents at homicide, 
And poisoned goblets for faithless squablets by 

knightly gallants were justified; 
When maids were fairest, and baths were rarest, and 

thaumaturgy was wrought by dames, 
When courts were rotten and faith forgotten, and only 

clergy could write their names — 

When he who flouted the Church, or doubted, would 
find his neck fast in hempen ruflP, 

And saint and sinner thought eggs for dinner and 
beer for breakfast the proper stuff ; 

When men were scary of witch and fairy, of haunted 
castle, of spook and elf, 

When every mixer of cough elixir was thought a 
vassal of Nick himself; 

When income taxes and prophylaxis and Comic Sec- 
tions were yet unborn, 

When Leagues of Nations and Spring Vacations and 
Fall Elections were held in scom — 



Piping and Panning 1 1 



When all brave fellows would fight duellos with sword 

and dagger, with lance and mace, 
When good men guzzled until, clean fuzzled, they'd 

reel and stagger about the place ; 
When pious journeys and jousts and tourneys brought 

high adventure and secret tryst, 
When knives were many, but forks not any — 'twas 

fist to trencher, and mouth to fist ! — 
Oh, men had chances for true romances, for fame 

and glory and knightly acts . . . 
(And childish quarrels and beastly morals, if song and 

story would stick to facts!) 



12 Piping and Panning 



A DISAGREEABLE FEATURE 

She has a bright and clever mind, 

Her cheek with heahh and beauty glows ; 

I wish she had a more refined. 
Nose. 

I like the saucy retrousse, 

Admire the Roman, love the Greek ; 
But her's is none of these — It's a 

Beak. 

Soon as the sun of summer sets, 
Or ever winter's snows are shed, 

That hapless feature always gets 
Red. 

The hints that beauty sharps indite 
Account for this in many ways ; 

Some say it comes from wearing tight 
Stays. 

O lady fair, let such be shunned ! 

A larger waist, a looser boot 
Were better than a rubicund 

Snoot ! 

And you'd improve its shape, Got wot. 

And look less like a pink pug pup 
If you would wipe it down, and not 

Up! 



Piping and Panning 13 

Farewell ! That love cannot endure 
Though you have every other grace 

Is plain as is the nose on your 
Face ! 



14 Piping and Panning 



THINGS I DESPISE 

The sting of a hornet, 

The sound of a cornet, 
The odor of all antiseptics ; 

Set speeches that sparkle 

With wit patriarchal ; 
Their symptoms as told by dyspeptics. 

A tennis court grassy, 

A child that is sassy. 
The green worms that breed on tomatoes ; 

Folk saying " tomahtoes " 

As rhyming with " grottoes," 
Thus leaving no rhyme for " potatoes." 

All lap-dogs and parrots, 
And egg plants and carrots; 

New, hard-finished, slick linen towels; 
The raw Dead Man's Gulcher 
Who imitates culture 

By broadening American vowels; 
Sloe gin, Gertrude Hoffman, 
Cold gravy. Herb KaufFman, 

Free verse, cubist art, Mrs. Grundy; 
Warm beer, Herbert Spencer, 
George Viereck, the censor. 

Amy Lowell, New York, Billy Sunday. 

All pictures of lovers 
On magazine covers, 



Piping and Panning 15 

All women who smoke, and drink highballs ; 

All hearty young smarties 

Who spoil quiet parties 
By butting in soused to the eyeballs ; 

These things, as I pen 'em, 

I loathe with a venom 
That's strange in a jester and japer — 

And I'd carry the list on, 

But have to desist, on 
Account of the high price of paper! 



1 6 Piping and Panning 



THINGS I LIKE 

Young onions, brown toffy, 

Walt Mason, iced coffee, 
Soft pencils, rare beef, English mustard; 

The ravishing, mellow, 

Rich tones of the 'cello; 
Fox terriers, Mae Marsh and cup custard. 

A pipe after dinner, 

Sweet Corn, Otis Skinner, 
Plum jam; and I own I am partial 

To old fashioned poker — 

(No " wild " cards, nor joker) 
Wheat cakes, and Vice President Marshall. 

Pepys' Diary ; tiny 

Red radishes ; Heine ; 
Girls, birds, slippers, country physicians ; 

Unitarian preachers. 

Cut plug, Latin teachers, 
H. G. Wells, Robert Frost, first editions. 

The dawn of a May day, 

The dawn of a pay-day, 
F. P. A., Thomas Hardy, Bab Ballads; 

Rabelais and Puccini, 

Benvenuto Cellini, 
And garlic in all of my salads. 



Piping and Panning 17 

Traditions of tribal 

Beliefs, like the Bible; 
Bass fishing, the legends of Gleeman; 

Good cider — just tinglish — 

East Cleveland, pure English ; 
Thin socks, Oscar Wilde, Owen Seaman. 

These things, and some others, 

I love, O my brothers. 
The list is quite candidly stated ; 

But this comes to grieve me — 

'Twas harder believe me, 
To write than the things that I hated ! 



1 8 Piping and Panning 



RHYME POVERTY 

'Tis sad (we may have mentioned this before) 

That there are many things we may not sing 
Because they have no rhymes, or one, not more — 

And that one oft an unrelated thing. 
For instance, would we praise the lordly elk, 

(The antlered or the watch-charm-bearing sort) 
We must go far afield and speak of " whelk," 

(A shellfish seldom sought for food or sport). 

And if a line should chance to end with " web," 

Or if one speaks of Nature's verdant garb. 
That former line must always rhyme with "ebb," 

This latter verse perforce ends with a " barb." 
And never can you send your hero forth 

Women to win, or f oemen's casques to carve ; 
He can't go any other way but " north " — 

And there, can do no other thing but " starve 1 " 

Ah, words are garments lofty thoughts to clothe, 

As clothes the tender green the rural tilth; 
Yet though you loathe it, here you must use " loathe," 

And here, more loathsomely, you must use " filth." 
How can a poet play a mighty fugue 

When rhymes for such important words are 
scarce? 
How even end a verse like this, when naught 

Rhymes with the fifth line — and the sixth with 
nothing ? 



Piping and Panning 19 



YOU CAN'T ESCAPE IT 

I have a friend who likes to chat 

On things that he has read; 
He isn't such a bore, at that, 

When all is done and said. 
But he commits one dire offense 

That hits me on the raw — 
He will explain the difference 

'Twixt Chesterton and Shaw ! 

I know not why it is I must 

Submit, with inward woe. 
To hear this dreary theme discussed, 

Wherever I may go; 
'Twere as significant to me 

The parallel to draw 
'Twixt Tweedledum and Tweedledee, 

As Chesterton and Shaw. 

To every eager, cultured youth, 

I must pretend surprise 
To learn that " one makes lies of truth, 

And one makes truth of lies," 
And each discovers it anew. 

And I must treat with awe 
The Tricky Tenets of the Two— 

Of Chesterton and Shaw! 



20 Piping and Panning 

Oh, let the ancient subject go, 

And I'll be well content 
To swear that all you say is so 

Without an argument ; 
And I will grant you, if you please, 

By God's mysterious law, 
That chalk is different from cheese, 

And Chesterton from Shaw ! 



Piping and Panning 21 



SOME ANGLICISMS 

I have written of various kinds of weather, 
For all of the weathers are rhymes to me; 

I have more than once added " we strolled together " — 
(For more on this subject, see Calverly.) 

And I've often been forced to refer to heather, 
Though I haven't a notion what heather may be ! 

Invention, at times, is bound to slacken. 
And Pegasus, balking, must yield to force ; 

The ink must dribble, the page to blacken. 
For rhymes must be writ as a matter of course; 

At times I've employed it — but what is "bracken"? 
And what in the dickens are " furze and gorse " ? 

And often in spring, when the sensuous hymn rose, 

I've written to praise it as poets do; 
When the new-budded saplings were standing in slim 
rows, 

And the cute little posies were pink and blue. 
Then I've mentioned (but never have seen) a primrose, 

And tell me, what sort of a tree is " yew " ? 

'Tis harder for a rhymester to keep from falling 

For fauna and flora in Britain made, 
Where cushat and mavis and merle are squalling 

To starling and rook in the box-tree's shade, 
And vicar and curate are sweetly calling, 

And sipping their muffins and marmalade! 



22 Piping and Panning 



THE DRAWBACKS OF HUMOR 

No sage am I, who would aspire, 

To wisdom and profundity ; 
Tis mine to pluck the lighter lyre, 

Promoting sweet jocundity. 
" Laugh," says the proverb, " and acquire 

A comforting rotundity." 

And yet I find that constant mirth 

May be itself injurious; 
There is a point at which the girth 

Gets almost too luxurious — 
Tis then that I come down to earth 

And am of wit penurious. 

My tendency to take on weight 

Is growing indisputable. 
And much I doubt if such a state 

For any bard is suitable; 
HI neglect it till too late, 

It might become immutable! 

So if, at times, I cease to jest. 
And write with grim austerity, 

Think not I've lost my interest — 
Don't question my sincerity; 

I'm solemn to reduce my vest, 
And slimness means severity! 



Piping and Panning 23 



LINES TO A SMALL PERSON 

My temper, as you know, is mild, 

Because I have a good digestion; 
So, when I speak to you, my child, 

Upon a most important question. 
You need not have the slightest fear 

That I shall threaten you or scold you ; 
My disposition's not severe, 

As I believe that I have told you. 

The modern parent may not smite 

His offspring, nor address him rudely ; 
Our forbears, we are told, were quite 

Mistaken when they wrought so crudely. 
We may not slap the tiny hands 

For any fault or childish treason ; 
Not even must we give commands, 

Unless we tell the child the reason. 

Therefore, to speak as Science bids, 

In which I am a firm believer, 
I wish to warn you that the kids 

Across the street have scarlet fever. 
I do not wish to have you shun 

Your kind, nor go without a playmate, 
But will you please avoid them, son, 

Until they've started to desquamate ? 



24 Piping and Panning 

Or, if you don't believe in germs 

(And many people seem to doubt them) 

Please state your case in rigid terms, 
And we shall say no more about them. 

What's that you say? I make you sick? 
My little son, I hate to bother. 

But I am glad to cut this stick- 
In case of failure. Come to Father! 



Piping and Panning 25 



LOVE LYRICS 

To sing a song both sweet and strong 

To praise the bosom's deity 
Requires some art of head and heart, 

As well as spontaneity. 
Not only must its lines be just, 

Its wit without frivolity — 
It must be clear, and sound sincere, 

And have a polished quality. 

The bard of love must rise above 

The literal, and realize 
That prose may chaff or photograph, 

But verses must idealize. 
Love's pain and woes appear in prose 

As calm as in a diary; 
Whereas the fire of song's desire 

Should, at the least, be fiery. 

But fire alone will not atone 

For lack of virtuosity; 
Without the wile of grace and style. 

It's just a crude monstrosity. 
Who writes a song as hot and strong 

As chili dishes Mexican 
Must work for days with Pete Roget's 

Invaluable lexicon ! 



26 Piping and Panning 

You hack, you hew, you sing it through, 

You blot and you eliminate ; 
You substitute a word to suit. 

You study and discriminate. 
If what you use you rightly choose, 

Rejecting what's extraneous. 
You're close to fame, if men exclaim — 

" How artlessly spontaneous ! " 



Piping and Panning 27 



IDLE REFLECTIONS 

When Christopher Columbus said he thought the 
earth was spherical, 

He scandalized the scholars, both the secular and 
clerical — 

They said his head was ivory, his visions all chimeri- 
cal. 

When first a daring soul announced that oysters were 
digestible, 

And prophesied that they should be a popular comes- 
tible, 

No doubt his notions were assailed as perfectly de- 
testable. 

When Jenner from a dread disease could give the 

world immunity, 
The scoffers stoned his house and pulled his whiskers 

with impunity, 
And jeered at him and called him names, at every 

opportunity ! 

Yet each of those discoveries remained for time to 

vindicate. 
And profit followed in the paths that genius could but 

indicate. 
And each of them became in time exploited by a 

syndicate. 



28 Piping and Panning 

Now I've discovered something that is very near a 

miracle ; 
Whene'er I think about it, I grow absolutely lyrical — 
But shall I spring it on my friends, and hear them 

get satirical? 

And shall I join the goats and unappreciated goatesses 
Who have to die before they get their hard-earned 

reading notices? 
Nay, nay — I'd rather twang the lyre and lie among 

the lotuses ! 



Piping and Panning 29 



YOUTH AND SORROW 

A score of years ago, 

When I was in my 'teens, 
The verse I wrote was full of woe, 

Describing tearful scenes. 
I sang of pain and strife, 

I moaned of toil and care, 
And, oh! the tragedy of life 

Was quite too hard to bear! 

A graying lock or two, 

A touch of rheumatiz 
The monthly bills a-coming due — 

Existence as It Is — 
Have made me pipe, at length, 

A much more cheery song ; 
I sing of health and youth and strength- 

The Poem of the Strong ! 

If that's the way it goes, 

(And that's the way it seems) 
When I get old, why I suppose 

ril sing of lovers' dreams ; 
I'll don the motley gay, 

I'll caper, grin and strut. 
And everyone that reads will say 

" The old guy's off his nut ! " 



30 Piping and Panning 



HISTORY 

When the rough and ready freeman of the land of 
Lacedaemon 

Were preparing for war, 
There was never much complaining of a lack of proper 
training 

Or the right esprit-dc-corps. 
For the discipline Lycurgean caused each callow youth 
to burgeon 

Into adamantine strength — 
Caring little for esthetics, they went in for stiff ath- 
letics 

To most surprising length. 

'Twas a course that might dishearten any pacifistic 
Spartan 

Who would rather write, or talk; 
Every blasted, bloomin' blighter had to learn to be a 
fighter. 

From the time that he could walk. 
They neglected every science not connected with de- 
fiance 

Of a theoretic foe, 
And the pigeon-hearted slacker they would beat till he 
was blacker 

Than the blackest thing you know ! 



Piping and Panning 31 

But the thing I wished to mention for your studious 
attention 

Was the outcome of the scrap, 
Long, but never undramatic, 'twixt the Doric and the 
Attic 

For a place upon the map ; 
When the Spartans military went against the hterary 

Men of Athens from afar — 
And the gentlemen artistic from the warriors pugilistic 

Knocked the everlasting tar! 



32 Piping and Panning 



PUZZLED 

She climbed that fence, one day, when I 
Just happened to be standing by ; 
A charming flush was on her face, 
As, with a sort of awkward grace, 
She squirmed across, with skirts awry. 

I cannot think I played the spy — 
I had not come to peep and pry. 
A gleam of silk, a flash of lace — 
She climbed that fence ! 

She must have known the fence was high, 
She must have known that I was nigh. 
The gate was in its proper place — 
She used it coming back. Oh base 
Suspicion ! . . . Yet, I wonder why 
She climbed that fence. 



Piping and Panning 33 



LONGING 

I think I have a modern mind, 

I Hke the latest fads and fancies ; 
My roomy shelves are always lined 

With strictly up to date romances. 
The newest modes of thought and art 

Are sure to gain my strict adherence, 
And all the ethics reckoned smart 

On first appearance. 

I think the Teuton should be led 

By kindly laws to love the Latin ; 
I think that convicts should be fed 

On terrapin, and clothed in satin ; 
Much of my leisure I devote 

To faddy foods and prophylaxis; 
Women, I think, should have the vote, 

And pay the taxes. 



But, ah! Sometimes I sit and muse 

On days of old, when knights were knightly ; 
And think that we go near to lose 

The simple art of living rightly. 
Not so complex the rule of life, 

In spacious days of Goth and Vandal — 
A gentleman could lick his wife 

Without a scandal. 



34 Piping and Panning 

The world is better now, than then, 

And Hfe, of course, is more worth living; 
We've fairer women, wiser men. 

And greater cause for glad thanksgiving. 
We go too far, though — grow too quick — 

I think forbearance must depress them ; 
We ought to be allowed to lick 

Our wives, God bless them! 



Piping and Panning 35 



A PLAINT 

Written by a man whose wife has gone away on a visit, 
leaving him alone m the house. 

Though but a day or two are passed, my dear, 
Since you departed on your Httle trip, 

I long full-soul again to have you here ; 
I go with moistened eye and quivering lip 

About the tasks that you were wont to do; 

My heart is empty, and I long for you ! 

I miss you from the breakfast table, love. 
And equally when comes my time to lunch; 

Strange echoes sound from empty rooms above — 
Beneath my feet there sounds a sickening scrunch ! 

Nothing, I think, obtains my nanny more 

Than doth ground coffee, sprinkled on the floor. 

I do not like the bed I used last night — 
The guest room isn't half so nice as ours ; 

But ours seems rumpled, and to fix it right, 
I have discovered, is beyond my powers. 

The baby's bed shall be tonight's resort — 

Tomorrow night, I'll use the davenport. 

Come back, dear love, ere I abandon hope ! 

It is a helpless, lonely soul that begs ! 
I cannot find the matches, or the soap — 

And no clean pans are left for frying eggs. 
The sink is clogged with broken loaves and fishes, 
The tables all are heaped with dirty dishes ! 



36 Piping and Panning 

Come back, sweet girl, and soothe an aching heart ! 

Come back and cheer this miserable poet ! 
I always felt we could not live apart, 

And now, from dire experience, I know it! 
Naught, naught is left my anguish to divert — 
No joys in life, no buttons on my shirt ! 



Piping and Panning 37 



UNCONGENIAL 

He attracted me — he'd loaned me 

Rare old books, and such as that; 
1 was glad, then, when he phoned me 

He was coming for a chat. 
I admired his bookish learning, 

And his culture being all 
That one speaks of as " discerning," 

I looked forward to his call. 



I prepared my little study 

For an evening of delight — 
Built the grate fire warm and ruddy, 

Drew the shades against the night; 
Slightly altered the positions 

Of the footstools, here and there — 
Laid my treasured First Editions 

By the comfortablest chair. 

Then I opened up a dandy 

Box of superfine cigars; 
And I put tobacco handy 

In some humidors and jars. 
And the meerschaums and the briers 

That are very special pets — 
Purged with ancient, fragrant fires ! — 

And three kinds of cigarets. 



38 Piping and Panning 

Well, he came. And he departed 

Earlier than I had planned ; 
And I'm not so broken-hearted 

That he's gone, you understand. 
Yes, I know that he is very 

Clever, and can talk and joke; 
Yes, his tastes are literary. 

But — the fellow doesn't smoke ! 



Piping and Panning 39 



MAKING MYSTERY 

The man that fixed my typewriter, he showed me what 

was wrong; 
He fixed the little dingus that had bothered me so 

long, 
He straightened out a doodad, and he tightened up a 

screw. 
And the old machine made music as it did when it 

was new ! 
It took but fifteen minutes to adjust the twisted 

gear — 
And I had tinkered vainly at the thing for half a 

year; 
I voiced my admiration, as the man picked up his hat — 
" I wish that I could learn," said I, " to fix up things 

like that!" 

The man that fixed my typewriter, he frankly an- 
swered, "Why, 

It's something anyone can do — you've only got to 
try. 

You keep this oiled, you keep that clean, you give this 
screw a turn, 

Do thus and so and t'other, and that's all you've got 
to learn. 

Now sit and write a line or two, and see how smooth 
it goes." 

So I sat and wrote a jingle, which is easier than prose. 



40 Piping and Panning 



And as I wrote, that young mechanic worshipfully 

sat — 
" My gosh ! " cried he, " 1 wish that I could do a stunt 

Hke that ! " 

I did not answer honestly, as he had done — not I — 
" It's something anyone can do ; you've only got to try. 
You scatter accents evenly, and give your words a turn, 
Do thus and so and t'other, and that's all you've got to 

learn." 
I did not answer honestly to him — but what's the use ? 
He has explained his trade, but still it's cryptic as the 

deuce. 
So let me think that fixing up machinery is hard, 
And I will still pretend that it takes brains to be a 

bard! 



Piping and Panning 41 



HOW HE TURNED OUT 

When he was young, his parents saw (as parents by 
the miUion see) 

That Rollo had an intellect of quite unequaled bril- 
liancy ; 

They started in his training from the hour of his 
nativity, 

And carefully they cultivated every bright proclivity. 

At eight, he ate up authors like a literary cannibal, 
At nine he mastered Latin as the Latins mastered Han- 
nibal ; 
At ten he knew astronomy and differential calculus, 
And at eleven could dissect the tiniest animalculus. 

At twelve, he learned orthometry, and started in to 
master all 

The different kinds of poetry, the lyric and the pas- 
toral. 

The epic and dramatic, the descriptive and didactical, 

With lessons theoretical and exercises practical. 

Music he learned — the old and sweet, the up-to-date 

and hideous ; 
He painted like Apelles and he modeled like a Phidias ; 
In language he was polyglot, in rhetoric Johnsonian, 
In eloquence Websterian, in diction Ciceronian. 



42 Piping and Panning 

At last, with learning that would set an ordinary head 

agog, 
His education far outshone his most proficient peda- 

gog; 

And so he entered life, with all his lore to lift the lid 

for him — 
And what do you imagine that his erudition did for 

him? 

Alas ! I fear the truth will shock you, rather than 

amuse you all — 
To those who've read thisi sort of verse, the sequel is 

unusual ; 
This man (it's hard on humor, for it breaks the well 

known laws of it!) 
Was happier for his learning, and a great success 

because of it! 



Piping and Panning 43 



THE AUCTIONEER 

I was walking t'other morning, strolling through the 
busy city, 
In a noisy portion of it, in a district strange and 
crowded ; 
When there rose without a warning something like a 
lilting ditty — 
Though the racket rose above it, it was never dulled 
or shrouded. 
And it rose and fell insistent, penetrating and stac- 
cato 
Like a sort of obbligato to the chorus near and 
distant ; 
And my idle feet went straying toward the music so 
impassioned — 
'Twas a sale — and the old-fashioned funny auc- 
tioneer was saying: 

" Got the quarter, gimme thirty, got the quarter, 

gimme thirty, 
I want thirty, gimme thirty — drop that, kid, your 

hands are dirty! 
Got the thirty, now be sporty — spring a dime and 

make it forty — 
Make it forty, I want forty, where's the forty, gimme 

forty. 
Forty, forty, forty — blank you, are you all asleep? 

I thank you — 



44 Piping and Pannina 

Here's a gent awake and thrifty — got the forty, gimme 
fifty, 

Got the iorty, gimme fifty. Listen ! Here's a first- 
class, nifty 

Bargain — and I have to holler till I'm hoarse for half 
a dollar! 

What's the matter, for gawsake — you think a dime will 
make or break you? 

Here's a solid, tested, candled, full-jooled and ma- 
hog'ny handled, 

All wool, guaranteed, imported, fireproof, airtight 
picked and sorted 

Gen-you-wine French Russia leather, automatic inno- 
vation — 

Wear it in all kinds of weather, and beware of imi- 
tation 1 

Going — once! Why, folks, we're throwing these 
away ! It's wicked ! Going 

Twice ! Say, are you here for pastime ? Going for 
the third and last time — 

Sold — to that gent with the funny set o' whiskers. 
Get his money ! " 

Then I went, my ear drums ringing, but I knew — and 

still I know it — 
Where the " Hiawatha " poet learned the manner of 

his singing! 



Piping and Panning 45 



"ELEVEN MILLION WORDS FREQUENTLY 
MISPRONOUNCED " 

I won a little wager 

On the name of Meleager, 

As to how it should be properly pronounced. 

And my scholarly opponent who was trounced 
Made a bold attempt to borrow 
The brochure that brought him sorrow. 
But I wouldn't let him take 

It, that's all there is about it ; 
Though I hate it like a snake, 

Yet I couldn't do without it. 
I consult the volume daily, though it's wormwood and 

it's gall 
To find that I say rightly scarcely any words at all ! 

Whene'er I take a look 
In that nasty little book. 

Then I blush in contemplation 
Of my common conversation, 
And bewail the money wasted on the sort of education 
That was sawed off on my unsuspecting youth. 
Tt was criminal conversion — that's the truth! 

But I'm learning something, now. 

And you'd laugh to notice how 
I can always take a fall 
Out of friends who come to call. 

Though they're very altitudinous of brow I 



46 Piping and Panning 

Here I've learned that Mrs. Hemans 

Should be made to rhyme with lemons, 
And I've made her rhyme with demons, till to- 
day! 

And I used to think " paresis " 

Was a perfect rhyme for " thesis " — 
But it's " Harris's " it rhymes with, so they 
say. 

And I used to think " Pariah " 

Made a jingle with "Maria," 
And that ptomaine rhymed with Romaine, 
And that Cocaine rhymed with Joe Kane; 

I thought that every Highland lad 

Was wont to wear a tartan plaid, 
And by this book I'm now dismayed 
To learn that Scots pronounce it " plaid." 

Oh, potato is potato, 

On the hill or in the grotto, 
But there's some that say tomato, 

While the others say tomato. 
And I contemplate a seizure 

Of some light complaint, with pleasure — 
Shall I say it gives me leisure, 

Or that now I'll have some leisure? 
Some day, when life's fitful fever 

Leaves, or ere I sleep forever, 
Haply I'll recall if " lever " 

Is correct, or if it's " lever " ! 



Piping and Panning 47 

If I only take a look, I can find it in my book — 
To remember all these things is only luck; 

But the thing that makes me mad at that little book, 
egad, 
Is, I never have it with me when I'm stuck ! 



48 Piping and Panning 



VALE! 

A Chicago professor gives the opinion that time is zcasted 
in the study of Latin and Gr^cek. He thinks that the dead 
should be allowed to bury their dead languages, and that 
something useful should be taught in our colleges. 

Ay, Prof., you're right ! Those dogs have had their 
day; 

Back to their shades let modern scholars send 'em. 
Dry as their dust, let's put 'em on their way — 

Nunc est hihendum! 

In former times, 'twas very well to be 

Up in the classics. But we're getting canny 

As years glide past us — " Eheu, Postumc, 
Labuntiir anni!" 

Farewell, ye Greeks ! Romans, a long good-bye ! 

Hebrews, no more to you shall scholars toady ! 
We're done with Virgil, Homer, Omar — ay, 

"Persicos odi!" 

Helen talks Spanish, now ; Euphrosyne 

Speaks French — why not? There's nothing to pre- 
vent 'em. 
In Low Dutch I can hear sweet Lalage 

"Duke loquentem." 

'Tis settled, so a truce to all of this. 

The gods are dead — the profs have overthrown 'em. 
Great Pan is — never mind ; " De mortuis 

Nil nisi boniim!" 



Piping and Panning 49 



WE OLYMPIANS 

I studied Lucian in my youth 

(Though not advised to by my teachers) 
And learned from him the joyous truth 

That gods are very human creatures; 
And that howe'er with tawdry art 

And vain display we prink and primp us, 
Our folhes had a counterpart 

Among the dwellers on Olympus. 

The petty spats, the vanities, 

The sulks and silly altercations ; 
The family jars, the jealousies. 

The semi-serious flirtations — 
Indeed they were so much at odds. 

So prone to fight instead of frolic, 
Methinks the nectar of the gods 

Was very largely alcoholic! 

Though when they came to earth, no doubt 

They thought to make mere man their debtor, 
I think the less that's said about 

The gallantries of Zeus, the better. 
And Ares came to make us rue 

The day Prometheus wrought to shape us, 
And Dionysius added to 

The horrid mischief of Priapus! 



50 Piping and Panning 

When a mere mortal goes astray, 

He blames it on his human nature; 
What have the erring gods to say 

Before their own high legislature? 
We men expect creation's lords 

To be correct in thought and action — 
The fact that they are not, affords 

Considerable satisfaction. 



Piping and Panning 51 



AN OLD FABLE 

The Grasshopper knocked at the Ant's back door, 

When the autumn winds blew cold, 
For he knew that the Ant had a toothsome store, 

Of the Grub that is better than Gold. 
" Oh, give me a bed and a bite," he said, 

But the Ant replied, " Not so — 
You're an idle bummer who sang all summer, 

So now you can go eat snow ! 

REFRAIN 

"I shan't, I shan't, I shan't! 
It's good for your health to bant — 
It's highly improper for any Grasshopper 
To sponge from a thrifty Ant ! " 

The Grasshopper sang a melodious song, 

And this is the way it went — 
" I've been on the jump all summer long, 

But I couldn't lay up a cent! 
You crawled around on the sandy ground, 

I hustled the season through; 
As one of the Masses, I ask you to pass us 

Your unearned revenue ! " 

REFRAIN 

" You can't, you can't, you can't ! 
Let Socialists rave and rant. 



52 Piping and Panning 

Such grasshopper-logic is too demagogic 
To bother a frugal Ant ! " 

The Grasshopper softly began to sing 

An amorous chansonette. 
(Have I told you the Ant was a feminine thing, 

And a sort of a suffragette?) 
" Oh, let us be wed, dear Ant ! " he said — 

" 'Tis for love, not food, I die ! " 
He sang it so slickly, he landed her quickly. 

In spite of her shocked reply — 

REFRAIN 

"I shan't— you shan't— I can't!" 
(Her bosom began to pant! — 
It's very improper for any Grasshopper 
To flirt with a maiden Ant!) 



Piping and Panning 53 



THE QUESTION SETTLED 

The average man's heart weighs from ten to twelve ounces; 
the average woman's from eight to ten. — Anatomy Note. 

So it is settled — the vexed question, old 
As Eve and Adam, young as you and me : 

Which loves the other more, when all is told — 
Is't He or She? 

Score one for Man ! By nature's changeless laws, 
He wins the right to chortle and to snigger, 

His love is proven greater, just because 
His heart is bigger. 

But I, my dear, won't rub it in on you; 

Why talk of what the scientist discovers? 
It's settled, but — well, what's an ounce or two 

Between us lovers? 

You'd still debate it ? Holy smoke ! Great Scott ! 

All right — I'll yield, lest I should seem a churl ; 
I am an average man, but you are not 

An average girl ! 



54 Piping and Panning 



AFFECTIONS 

When blue the arch that bends above, 
And sweet the breeze as taffy, 

I love my country with a love 
That's nothing less than daffy ; 

'Tis then I love those rocks and rills, 

Those woods and well known templed hills. 

Oh, then my heart, as in the song, 

Reacts to thrills of rapture, 
And I admire the Pilgrim throng 

Who took the land by capture. 
And made the Indians move away. 
However much they wished to stay. 

For time has proved the Pilgrims right, 

And I approve the sequel — 
How otherwise could I delight 

In being free and equal ? 
How could I dance with holy 'glee. 
And sing, " My country, 'tis of thee "? 

Now, should a host of foemen come 

Across the Heap Big Water 
I'd toot my trumpet, beat my drum, 

And whet my sword for slaughter. 
And if they said that they were Pil- 
Grim Fathers, I'd laugh fit to kill ! 



Piping and Panning 55 

I love my land a lot too much 

To let another land it; 
I love my land to beat the Dutch, 

Or any alien bandit; 
I love its climate and its trees, 
Therefore, let music swell the breeze ! 

Let mortal tongues awake, and cinch 
These gifts of heaven's bounty ; 

No enemy shall have one inch 
Of Cuyahoga county! 

No foeman's foot shall ever tread 

My patriotic onion bed ! 

And so, 'neath Freedom's holy light 
Long may my beans be weeded; 

Long may our native land be bright — 
Except when rain is needed! 

I love my country more than breath, 

So give me liberty or death! 



56 Piping and Panning 



TO ORDER 

"Oh, for a poet to sing the praises of a hot brick! " 

— DONAHEY. 

I sing the brick, the balmy brick, 

The brick that bars the blustering blizzard ! 

The brick that's wrapped with flannel thick, 
To warm the feet and cheer the gizzard ! 

The blessed brick that cures the sick — 
Wild winter's wise and wondrous wizard ! 

Brick of my sires, that saved their toes 
Ere water bags had been invented ! 

Brick of my youth, that soothed my woes, 
And made me drowsy and contented ! 

Thy memory like a hearth fire glows — 
As dear, as warm, as much lamented ! 

Around that memory what a flock 

Of tender recollection hovers! 
They heated thee beside the crock 

Where raised the dough for buckwheat lovers- 
Then wrapped thee in a woolen sock, 

And shoved thee down beneath the covers ! 

Quick we disrobed and tucked us in 
With tingling toes and ankles bitey. 

And quick thy warmth caressed each shin 
In mystic manner, mild but mighty, 

And smoothed the gooseflesh on the skin 
That shivered underneath our nighty ! 



Piping and Panning 57 

O beauteous brick ! For comfort's sake, 
Long in our love our souls shall see thee ! 

No clammy, rubber bag may take 

Thy place, nor banishment decree thee ! 

Share thou our couch for aye, and make 
Our winter's sleep a perfect Lethe ! 



58 Piping and Panning 



THE WOES OF YOUTH 

I do believe that one becomes 

More easy minded, happier, bolder, 
Less prone to worry over sums 

That won't work out, as one grows older. 
I think my appetite's more keen, 

I'm less mature, and think more simply 
Than when I was but seventeen, 

And pimply. 

I nearly died because a lass 

Had criticized my taste in collars; 
I thought that I would have no class 

At all without a million dollars. 
I thought I'd always stay a kid, 

Because — O horrible affliction ! — 
I couldn't talk as people did 

In fiction. 

Life was a complicated coil 

That only heroes could unravel — 
Men who consumed much midnight oil. 

And had a chance of foreign travel. 
Love was a heavenly thing, and too 

Sacred for me — a wicked sinner — 
I loved, but was too base, I knew. 

To win her! 



Piping and Panning 59 

Who sings " the simple joys of youth 

When Hfe brims o'er with sparkHng bubbles " 
Is either playing with the truth, 

Or has forgotten all his troubles, 
Youth is a thing of fear and doubt, 

Whose heart each terror stabs and mangles ; 
It takes the years to straighten out 

The tangles! 



6o Piping and Panning 



THE CRITICS APOLOGY 

Think not, dear readers, that I pose, 

Or, a presuming person, 
Think I am wise in verse and prose 

And things that one writes verse on. 
Though I am bound to criticize 

At times, and get the best of you, 
It does not follow that I'm wise 

Beyond the rest of you. 

To each one of the public though. 

Some one thing is a dumb thing ; 
Though wise to most things, don't you know 

He's ignorant of something. 
There follows then this circumstance 

Through all pretentious swaggering — 
The aggregate of ignorance 

Is something staggering ! 

If A knows everything but x, 

While X is B's whole learning, 
B can teach A — why should it vex 

A, if A be discerning? 
So though, dear public, what you do 

I find absurd and humorous, 
I'm just as ignorant as you, — 

But not so numerous! 



Piping and Panning 6i 



A VAIN LONGING 

Fd love to be a housewife ! I should love to spend my 

day 
In a cozy little kitchen while the moments sped away ! 
With the nicey, spicy odors, homey, and yet sharp and 

strange, 
And the genial warmth proceeding from the cunning 

little range; 
With the mysteries of cooking, and the knowledge of 

the power 
To turn out a fresh creation of one's genius, every 

hour; 
Oh, the drudgery of rhyming is a tame and thankless 

thing — 
I should love to be a housewife, that my very soul 

might sing! 

I'd love to be a housewife ! Making beds and sweep- 
ing floors — 

Washing windows if I chanced to need some exercise 
outdoors ; 

Ne'er a thought of earning wages to disturb the care- 
less brain 

Ne'er a fear of boss or foreman with its constant, 
prodding pain ; 

Just the simple round of duty, with the mind at perfect 
rest. 

Thinking thoughts of love and beauty — free, and giv- 
ing forth its best; 



62 Piping and Panning 

Oh, the world with all its worries is a falsehood and 

a snare — 
And I fain would be a housewife, free from every 

earthly care! 

Would that I had been a housewife ! Naught annoys 

her, year by year, 
But the tinner and the plumber when the bathroom's 

out of gear, 
And the grocer and the garbage and the babies and 

the rugs, 
And the garden and the furnace and the roaches and 

the bugs, 
And the neighbors with their gossip and the iceman 

with his dirt, 
And a slouchy, grouchy husband with the buttons off 

his shirt — 
Oh, it's fine to be a housewife, sheltered from the 

madding mob, 
(But a man that digs a sewer has a sweeter, easier 

job!) 



Piping and Panning 63 



THE LAST FRONTIER 

Far from the city's uttermost edge, 

And even beyond the suburban bounds, 
(Not even a factory had split a wedge 

Into the odors and sights and sounds 
Of the virgin country!) we wandered forth, 

And breathed in the freedom of rural space — 
And we looked to the south and we looked to the 
north, 

And we seemed alone in the Lord's own place! 

Jack-in-the-Pulpits and violets 

Trilliums, bloodroot and liverworts, 
We found and we noted — for one forgets 

In the space of a winter, the various sorts — 
Birds and serpents and toads and snails 

In trees and hollows we found with glee — 
Till at last we wandered from human trails, 

And nothing was left but the world to see ! 

Finally, lonesome for humankind, 

(So doth the townbred soul grow fond!) 
We searched a dwelling of man to find. 

And lit on a cabin, far beyond. 
Such is the shack that the lumberman rears, 

Over the border and far away — 
Such were the huts of the pioneers 

On the far frontiers in a bygone day! 



64 Piping and Panning 

Bravely, if wearily, trekked we thence 

To the tiny home in the desert waste — 
Fainting we stopped at the crazy fence 

That bounded the yard where the hut was 
placed. 
Out rushed our savior — a man, God wot ! — 

Shouting a welcoming cry to us, 
Bidding us rest in his rustic cot, 

Chanting a comforting paean, thus : — 

" This is the haven ye long have sought. 

This is the well in a waste despised ! 
These are the acres you'd ought to've bought. 

This here's the frontage we've advertised ! 
Here is the sewer we're putting through — 

Here's where the street cars will run, some 
day — 
This here's a lot that I'll sell to you 

For — " (We heard no more — we had swooned 
away I) 



Piping and Panning 65 



WITH US 

Spring missed us, this year, 

But the summer is coming — 
Just hark, and you'll hear 

How its herald is humming ! 

Don't you notice that drumming 
Way off in the distance, 
Coming nearer and nearer with thrilling insistence? 

Just note how it mumbles 

And grumbles and rumbles — 
Its chariots and horses and bugles come closer — 
An army? Why, no sir — 

'Tis summer itself, 

Ushered in by an Elf 
And a legion of varmints 
In many-hued garments, 

Skin-tight and bifurcous — 

My friend, it's the Circus ! 

And now it's so near 

That a blind man could tell it ; 
You don't have to hear, 

Nor to see — ^you can smell it ! 
And oh, what a luscious, magnificent scent, 
From the gate of the grounds to the door of the 
tent! 

Bolognas and " Coneys " 

And small sweaty ponies, 



66 Piping and Panning 

And popcorn and camels and red lemonade; 

Deep-lying, raw dust, 

Babies and sawdust — 
Food for the beasts that prefer it decayed ; 

Limp, paper dollars, 
Gretchens and Lenas, 

Celluloid collars, 
Apes and hyenas ; 

Monkeys and acrobats, dogs and Hawaiians, 

Elephants, stakedrivers, garlic and lions ; 
Leather well lathered, 

And animal cages — 
Smells that are gathered 

From all climes and ages — 
Mixed all together, they make up the whole 
Of the circus-smell — simimer-smell — balm to the soul ! 



Piping and Panning 67 



THE PLAINT OF APOLLOS 

Paul swore he'd plant a garden, and 

He did that little thing; 
He sowed away to beat the band 

For half a day, this spring. 
The ground was plowed and harrowed fine, 

And that appealed to Paul. 
And so he went right down the line, 

And drilled and sowed it all. 



He planted peas, he planted beans, 

He planted onions, too; 
He planted beets, he planted greens, 

He planted all he knew. 
And when he made it half a day 

Of course he had to quit — 
But said, just as he went away, 

I might look after it. 



The days are long, from noon to noon, 

Down on this little farm; 
And I must work both late and soon 

To keep the truck from harm. 
And I must bug and hoe and weed 

Until my back is sore. 
To show a profit on that seed 

When Paul comes back once more. 



68 Piping and Panning 

And there has come a dreadful drought 

Upon the thirsty soil, 
And water I must carry out 

With slow and grievous toil ; 
I dare not spend a week in town, 

For fear that, should I go, 
A parlous blight would settle down 

And lay Paul's garden low. 

But patiently I wait for Paul — 

I know I can't be wrong — 
He will return before it's fall, 

And bring his friends along; 
God gave the increase, I suppose, 

But Paul, that pleasant elf, 
Will show with pride the fruited rows 

Of " stuff he raised himself ! " 



Piping and Panning 69 

PUNCHINELLO 

I tried to quit the highway, but as I had found a 
byway 
To the other way from my way, I was fronted by 
a clown — 
One who struck me with a bladder full of peas ! Ah, 
sure a sadder 
Jocund jester, or a madder never wandered from 
the town ! 
He was daft, and going dafter, for he shrieked with 
eerie laughter, 
But the tears that followed after washed the red ofif 
From his face. " Now cease, old chap, your bunk," 
I said " or I will slap your 
Silly head off ! " 

It was hard, I don't deny it, but I couldn't stand the 
riot; 
When at last I got him quiet, I inquired about his 
name 
And his business. Sitting squatly, I demanded rather 
hotly 
Why the medieval motley, what the idiotic game? 
I had fled the conversation of acquaintance and re- 
lation. 
Just for quiet contemplation, rest and languor ; 
And the corybantic twaddle of this shatter-pated 
noddle 
Roused my anger. 



70 Piping and Panning 

Then this wild and woozy creature rubbed each parti- 
colored feature. 
And he mumbled ** I entreat your pardon ! " (Here 
he gave a sob) 
" I'm the thing your growing gray from ! I'm the one 
you cannot stray from ! 
I am what you ran away from, till I caught you. 
I'm your Job!" 
Oh, my anguish overcame me, and I shrieked — and do 
you blame me ? 
For he stick'fe to me to shame me, like a tumor ! 
He's my vampire, my obsession, the opprobrious pro- 
fession 
Some call " Humor ! " 



Piping and Panning 71 



IT HAPPENS, OFTEN 

There was a man in our town 
Whose Christian name was Jim; 

He stepped into a pot of glue, 
And fell and broke his limb. 

The doctors tried to set it, 
But still it would not mend; 

He limped about, and would, no doubt, 
Be limping to the end, 

But on a day it happened 
He walked abroad, and then 

He stepped into some other glue, 
And broke his leg again. 

And when his leg was mended, 
And he was out once more, 

Both leg and man were stronger than 
They'd ever been before! 

So, when I broke my heart, once, 
I thought of Mister Jim — 

I went and broke it once again. 
Now I'm as well as him ! 



72 Piping and Panning 



MENTAL PABULUM 

When I was a little boy, 

Every story had a moral — 
" Industry Is Crowned with Joy ; " 

" Little Children Should Not Quarrel." 
" Slow and Steady Wins the Race ; " 

" Save Today, and Have Tomorrow ; " 
" Poverty Is No Disgrace ; " 

" Careless Habits Lead to Sorrow." 



All the Good Boys started poor, 

All the Bad Boys rolled in riches ; 
Villain was a well dressed boor, 

Scorning patches on his breeches. 
But the climax of the tale 

Showed these unjust things adjusted- 
Hero always rolled in kale. 

Villain always finished busted. 

If we might proceed, I thought, 

To the second generation. 
We should find our families brought 

To an opposite relation; 
Virtue wears a ragged coat, 

Vicious kids in satin toddle — 
Hero's son would be the goat, 

Villain's son would be the model ! 



Piping and Panning 73 

Villain's grandson would be bad, 

Hero's grandson on the level ; 
V's great-grandson, charming lad — 

H's ditto, perfect devil ! 
So, although my youthful mind 

With an author dared not quarrel, 
In the long run I could find 

No quite satisfying moral! 



74 Piping and Panning 



A SAD THOUGHT 

Old Homer, in his very justly famous epic, speaks 

Of many a handsome leader of his clan; 
But also he has mentioned that among the warring 
Greeks 
Existed one sublimely ugly man. 
A cross-eyed, hare-lipped, hump-backed, weird mon- 
strosity was he, 
Whose homeliness alone procured him fame; 
So all children had convulsions, if they ever chanced 
to see 
His awful map! Thersites was his name. 



Now Nireus, on the other hand, he was a handsome 
bird— 
The kind some people call a Pretty Boy ; 
As Homer says (Book H, in line Six-hundred Sev- 
enty-third), 
" The loveliest man that ever came to Troy ! " 
How strange it was! Upon a day, this pair of con- 
trasts died, 
And went where heathen dead men have to go ; 
They crossed the Styx together, and were ushered 
side by side 
Before the throne of Pluto, down below. 



Piping and Panning 75 

King Pluto yawned abysmally within his palace dim, 

Upon an arm-chair made of skulls and ribs; 
" And who are these ? " he wished to know ; and 
Hermes answered him, 
" It's Nireus and Thersites, please Your Nibs ! " 
" Well, well ! " the monarch muttered ; " I have heard 
of them before — 
Both Nireus and Thersites — this is rich ! 
The Beauty and the Beast at once have crossed 
Cocytus' Shore; 
I'm very pleased to meet 'em. Which is which?" 



76 Piping and Panning 



" OUR SWEETEST SONGS " 

I've read an interesting thing 

About a very clever man; 
Light opera's anointed king 

Was Mister Arthur Sullivan — 
(The man to whom I thus refer 
Was shortly after made a " Sir "). 

It seems he suffered terribly 

For many months, by Fate's caprice, 
And, in his keenest agony, 

He made his merriest masterpiece; 
Weakened by suffering, sick and sore. 
He wrote the tunes for " Pinafore " ! 

Now, when I have an aching brow, 

A sore tooth or a gouty toe, 
I can't write verses anyhow — 

Unless it be a song of woe. 
Strange that such difference should be 
'Twixt Arthur Sullivan and me! 

If I should sprain a tendon, say, 
Or in an ankle put a crimp, 

You'd know it on the following day — 
My feet would halt, my accents limp ; 

When I am ill, I cannot joke — 

The Muse can only sob and croak ! 



Piping and Panning 77 

We have to sing, at all events, 

But when we sing, we make a fuss, 

And that is one marked difference 
'Twixt Arthur SulHvan and us. 

His Hfe was dark, his songs were bright — 

No wonder that they dubbed him knight ! 

Music may lull the mind to rest 
When all its aches are in the brain; 

Its charms may soothe the savage breast, 
They cannot soothe a savage pain. 

And you can bet your bottom dollar 

That when I'm hurt, I'm going to holler i 



78 Piping and Panning 



THE MYSTERY 

As supple a couple as ever I spied 

Were dancing and prancing at Jollity Hall; 
I gazed at them dazed at the grace of their glide, 

The buoyance, the joyance, the ease of it all ! 
The heat on the street on that hottest of nights 

Was stifling — but trifling compared with the place 
Where the two, mid that humid low ballroom, made 
flights 

That a swallow might follow in infinite grace. 

Her shoulder looked colder than marble, and fair 

As the sifted, new-drifted, immaculate snow ; 
As the crimson that dims on the sun's dying glare 

Did the peachbloom in each blooming cheek of her 
glow! 
And the hair of that pair of magicians remained 

Uncrumpled, unrumpled, unruffled and neat ; 
And they ended as splendidly cool and unstrained 

As they started, calm-hearted in all of that heat! 

If I, too, should try to exhibit my skill 

In two-steps and new steps, this time of the year, 
I would melt in my pelt in an instant, and spill 

In a torrent abhorrent, all over, I fear! 
Neither gracile nor facile in movement am I — 

I'm a duffer, and suffer a lot from the sun ; 
And I'll never endeavor to dance — nor to fly — 

But I wonder, by thunder, just how it is done! 



Piping and Panning 79 



IN VARIOUS KEYS 

How to do the daily poem? Shall we call our friends 
and show 'em 

Lilting trochees, how we know 'em just like Mr. Poe, 
of yore? 

Shall we write about the high light in a demon's eyes 
at twilight, 

Apes that crawl down through the skylight to imbue 
their hands with gore? 

Ghosts that make unpleasant noises — birds that ham- 
mer on the door, 

Fiends that howl forevermore? 

Or, moved by mellifluous meter 

To pleadings of passion and pain, 
Shall we swing to a sway that is sweeter 

Than rushes and ripples of rain? 
In words that make maidenhood's skin burn 

While eyes that are modest are dropped — 
In short, in the measures that Swinburne 

Was wont to adopt? 

Shall staid iambics be our joy to scan, 
And polished couplets of the Age of Anne? 
Hewn to the line, the chips fall where they must, 
The figures classic, and the measures just; 
Here careful art and industry combine, 
The tropes to polish and to turn the line ; 



8o Piping and Panning 

Here rule and compass point the way to truth, 
And scorn aHke the modern and th' uncouth ; 
The sober Muses treat with high disdain 
Th' improper conduct of a clouded brain, 
And so with patient toil the bard may hope 
To gain the infallibility of Pope ! 

Or shall we take a hint from Praed, 

And sport with antithetic phrases? 
Who goes to blaze that bosky glade 

Must step with care, or go to blazes; 
One takes a ten-inch gun along, 

Hymettus' honey hives to rifle, 
Or seeks a muse for lofty song 

And finds amusement in a trifle ! 

Oft in the silly rhyme 

We find our thought departed — 
But here, at least's a time 

It isn't even started ! 



Piping and Panning 8i 



"THE BALBOA" (1915) 

A new "national dance" by that name has b€cn introduced 
by the terpischorcan teachers. We dvn't know the music, 
but it probably goes to words like these: 

Have you heard that Balboa gHde? 
It's a hummer, it's a Culebra SHde ! 
It's a Panama-Pacific, beatific and terrific locomotion 

like the Ocean, 
With a split-apollinaris on the side. 
Old Noah 
Was a rowah. 
But Balboa 
Stayed on shoah, 

But he found the Big Salt Lake, that's no fake ; 
He's the kid that Keats called Cortez by mistake, 
And he stood upon a crag and he waved a Spanish flag 
And — he danced that Bal-bo-ah Ra-a-ag — 

CHORUS 

First, you stand on the sand, ain't it grand, 

Then you take her by the hand, 

Then you grab her round the Isthmus, 

And you dance from now till Christmas, 

She's the girl you feel like carryin' 

To that well known Peak in Darien, 

While you're doin' that Balboa glide! 



82 Piping and Panning 



THE TYPEWRITER'S SONG 

" Write me a verse, my old machine — 

I lack for an inspiration; 
The skies are blue and the trees are green, 

And I long for a long vacation. 
But moods like mine don't bother you, 

And I've written so much upon you 
That you ought to be good for a line or two 

Of your own accord, doggone you ! " 



(Then on its keys, as I thus implored, 

I laid my fingers lightly, 
As you lay your hands on a Ouija Board, 

And wait for a message spritely; 
But the old thing answered never a word 

To the mild request I proffered, 
And so, observing that naught occurred, 

These further thoughts I offered) : 

" For seven seasons I've been your nurse 

And valet and slave and crony ; 
To you I whispered my every verse, 

Ballad or gay canzone ; 
You're full of meters and unfledged dreams 

And sonnets that died a-borning — 
I've put 'em there — and it really seems 

You could help me out, this morning ! " 



Piping and Panning 83 

And again I waited, receptive, still, 

Anticipatory, eager 
To get the reply of the good old mill, 

No matter how dull and meager; 
A start ! A thrill ! A rattle — and then 

It pounds out, swift and hearty — 
" Now is the time for all good men 

To cotnc to the aid of their party." 



84 Piping and Panning 



RURAL DELIGHTS 

The days of my boyhood were spent 

In a very remote, Hoosier village ; 
And so, to a middling extent, 

I have knowledge of georgics and tillage. 
I've lived in the city for years. 

And my memory's more or less faulty, 
But I long for the country, with tears 

That are normally bitter and salty. 



I recall how we locked up the bees. 

And gathered the eggs from the ganders ; 
I remember the turkeys had fleas; 

And the cows were afflicted with glanders. 
I think we subsisted on oats 

And greens, when our stomachs were able— 
For we fed all the food to the shoats, 

And saved what they left for the table. 

We arose every morning at four. 

In the winter as well as in summer, 
And we washed just outside the back door, 

(Our folks never heard of a plumber!) 
We worked until long after day, 

For quitting at six was a scandal, 
And then we retired right away 

To save the expense of a candle. 



Piping and Panning 85 

O soul ! For these simply sublime 

Though primitive pleasures thou starvest ! 
For the raptures of hog-killing time, 

For the gladness of haying and harvest ! 
O heart that dost achingly yearn 

To taste them again, ere thou diest, 
When I hear thee desire to return, 

I sadly suspect that thou liest! 



86 Piping and Panning 



WHY? 

I share with all my friends the most bromidic of pro- 
clivities — 

I am a moving picture fan of regular activities ; 

The heroes I extenuate, the heroines idealize, 

And gain more inspiration from the dramas than I 
realize. 

Yet though the movies move me, and the thedabaras 
fascinate, 

There still remain some actors I am itching to 
assassinate ; 

There still remain some actions idiotic but habitual, 

Which anywhere and everywhere are practiced like 
a ritual. 

For instance, when the hero calls at office or at resi- 
dence. 

The cabin of the cowboys or the palace of the Presi- 
dents, 

He doesn't go and ring the bell, as would a common 
visitor. 

But stares at the outside as if he were a tax inquisi- 
tor ; 

He rolls his eyes from side to side, from other homes 
to single it. 

As if he had a contract for to paint the place and 
shingle it ; 



Piping and Panning 87 

Then nods his head, as if to say, with self-approving 

graciousness, 
" I've found the house ! You'll have to hand it to me 

for sagaciousness ! " 

Why is it, when our hero goes to ask a raise of 

salary. 
Or his employer's daughter's hand, or tickets for the 

gallery, 
He holds his hat in both his hands — and when they 

treat his wishes with 
Contempt, he wrings it like a rag that women wash 

the dishes with? 
I never treat a hat like that, my anguish to accentuate — 
My hat is stiff, and if I did, much damage would 

eventuate ; 
Someone should slip a derby to our hero for experi- 
ment — 
I think that the result would be some quite keystonian 

merriment ! 

Then there's the cowboy, living out among the sage 

and cactuses, 
He drives no cows, but spends his time in various 

sportive practices; 
Although for his profession on the prairies there is 

ample room. 
You never find him anywhere but in the village sample 

room. 



88 Piping and Panning 

I wonder why ! And why, when Fatty Arbuckle falls 

weightily 
From roofs and airplanes does the tumble never turn 

out fatally? 
Oh, yes, I love the movies and their heroine ethereal — 
But some day I shall murder the inventor of the Serial ! 



Piping and Panning 89 



A SONG OF THE MOVIE MEXICAN 

Oh, I am a brave desperado, 

And I wear a wide spreading sombrero ; 
I am noted for sneers and bravado, 

And I constantly dance the bolero. 
I murder the foul renegade, 

And I lose my dinero at faro ; 
And I lie in a dark ambuscado 

To capture my rival ranchero. 

(CHO.) 

Maraschino ! 

Peperino ! 
Don Pedro and Little Casino ! 

Merino, 

Tondino — 
Tortillas and chili and bino ! 

I run from brave 'Mericano, 

And I shrink from the soap and sapolio ; 
I play the guitar and piano, 

And I grease my frijoles with oleo; 
T sing the fandango, soprano. 

And I swipe the base Gringo's portfolio ; 
For I am the Mexican man, O, 

Who appears in each movie embroglio ! 

(CHO.) 

Maraschino ! etc. 



90 Piping and Panning 



THE SAILING OF THE MAYFLOWER 

Three hundred years ago, perdie, 

From out the port of Plymouth Town, 
In buckled shoe and russet gown, 

There sailed a goodlie companie. 

And one was there to count the polls, 

(And close-cropt, Roundhead polls were they!) 
And they that sailed upon that day, 

Says he, were just one hundred souls. 

One hundred sailed from Plymouth Dock, 
But when the tedious trip was done, 
There were one hundred souls plus one 

Who went ashore on Plymouth Rock ! 

But fift}'-one that winter died, 

And fifty lived to see the spring; 

And of these fifty, I would sing 
A song to spur my native pride. 

Now some of these were men bereft 
Of wives, and some were bachelors ; 
And so, upon these rocky shores 

Some twenty wedded pairs were left. 

A score of wedded pairs — and then 
Twelve generations pass away. 
And their descendants count today 

Not fewer than a million men ! 



Piping and Panning 91 

And each one of the lot can boast 
A bit of furniture or plate 
Included in the Mayflower's freight 

What time she touched our rock-bound coast ! 

O foolish claims to Pilgrim kin ! 
O silly heaps of spurious junk — 
(Except my carved Carolean trunk, 

Which I can prove is genuine!) 



92 Piping and Panning 



MYSTERIOUS CREATURES 

I try to gather knowledge, as I wander to and fro, 
And pick up new accomplishments no matter where I 

go; 
There's many an unknown creature in the earth and 

sea and air 
That well repays the student who will track it to its 

lair; 
And many a curious insect and many a novel bird 
I know, of which the ordinary man has never heard — 
While some, of equal consequence, I haven't any doubt, 
I cannot seem to find at all, much less to learn about. 

I've tamed to sweet obedience a savage blastoderm; 
And with a string around his leg I keep an isotherm. 
I've taught a syzygy to sing, an azimuth to dance. 
And I can make a kayak quail before my steady 

glance, 
A pair of rare abscissas hop about my onion bed, 
A blue zygoma's hide is nailed upon my carriage shed ; 
A shaddon's spreading antlers hang upon my study 

wall — 
But never in my life have I espied a gingival ! 

I know where bawsins build their nests afar from 

human eyes, 
And where the shy recidivist in gloomy jungle lies ; 
I know the plungeon's habits from the day he cuts his 

teeth, 



Piping and Panning 93 

And why the targum's fur is green above, but pink 

beneath. 
But all that special knowledge seems to me of little 

worth, 
Because I cannot run that cursed gingival to earth — 
Ay, and there's yet another thing that preys upon my 

mind — 
I cannot fitid, nor learn, one thing about a gavelkind ! 



94 Piping and Panning 



THE SHADY PAST 

I have read Langdon Smith's " Evolution," 

Much quoted a decade ago ; 
To its dreamy but virile locution 

Much food for reflection I owe. 
Transmigration's a fine institution, 

I honestly think — if it's so! 

Was I ever a sluggish molluscan 

In an antediluvian age? 
Was I ever a bronze-clad Etruscan, 

In battles with Rome to engage? 
Did I ever don doublet and buskin 

To strut the Shakespearean stage? 

Was my dwelling in Memphis or Sais, 
In days when Sesostris was king? 

Did I ever seek favor of Lais, 
In a long-ago Attican spring ? 

Have I sat with The Hero and Thais, 
To hear old Timotheus sing? 

Have I bickered with Lisbon longshoremen, 
Whose quarrels were settled with knives? 

Did I battle with Billy the Norman, 

Or the Saxons that strove for their lives? 

Have I lived as a Moor or a Mormon 
With a numerous harem of wives? 



Piping and Panning 95 

Perhaps I have sought El Dorado 
Through Panama's jungles and pits, 

Have fought with the smiling bravado 
Of villains that live by their wits — 

And died in a blind ambuscado, 
At Trinidad's port, or St. Kitts. 

You see, in this life of stagnation, 

So little exciting I've done. 
That the doctrine of re-incarnation 

Is a comforter second to none — 
It fills me with joyous elation 

To think that I've had so much fun ! 



96 Piping and Panning 



VILLANELLE OF A VILLANESS 

She was the daughter of Glubstein the Glover, 

Sooner or later, you'd hear about that. 
I wooed with poems, a lyrical lover. 

" We two shall dwell where the humming birds 
hover ! " 
Thus did I go with the Muse to the mat. 
She was the daughter of Glubstein the Glover. 

" Oh, for a home in the haunts of the plover! " 

(Knowing not plover from Angora cat, 
I wooed with poems, a lyrical lover!) 

" Then came the day when she chanced to discover 

What was my wage — and she got me my hat ! 
" She was the daughter of Glubstein the Glover — 

" Had I the nerve to take her — and to shove her 

Into some dingy old fifth-story flat?" 
I wooed with poems! A lyrical lover! 

" Go ! " and the chandelier rattled above her ! 
Out on the sidewalk was where I was at ! 
(She was the daughter of Glubstein the Glover; 
I wooed with poems — a lyrical lover.) 



Piping and Panning 97 



THE NEW ERA 

Sit down, dear Muse, and take a rest, I beg! 

Your warlike lyrics you must now abandon ; 
Your martial meters now have not a leg 

To stand on. 

No more shall Mars our solemn song inspire ; 

Our battle hymns seem now all stale and stupid. 
To Venus once again we'll tune the lyre — 

And Cupid! 

Away with war and all its fume and fuss. 
Its rumbling engines and its grim machinery ! 

Now we can think on beauty, and discuss 
The scenery. 

Those nymphs divine again our souls may vex 

Whose riddles are more puzzling than the Sphinx's ; 

Again we'll pay attention to the Sex — 
The minxes! 

Back, Muse, to Helicon's celestial shade ! 

Bellona's reign hath been both harsh and heartless. 
Verse is an art of peace — and war has made 

Us artless! 



98 Piping and Panning 



LYRIC MADE IN HOT WEATHER 

Oh, I should dearly love to be 

A fish that swimmeth in the sea ; 

A bird that flyeth in the air 

And findeth cooling breezes there; 

A walrus on a cake of ice — 

That too, methinks, were very nice. 

And yet, if I could have my wish, 
I should not pray to be a fish ; 
For, be the weather what it may. 
Fish must take water night and day ; 
And I retract my former word 
That I should like to be a bird — 
For though it would be nice to fly, 
It's hard work, too, and that is why. 
And though it also would be nice 
To sit upon a cake of ice, 
Yet 'twere much better I can see. 
To have that cake of ice in me. 

So like a bird I'll fly to shade, 
And there I'll have a drinklet made. 
And like a fish I'll soak it in 
Till it pervades my very skin; 
And in that beverage shall float 
A cake of ice to cool my throat, 
And I shall be more happy, far. 
Than bird and fish and walrus are ! 



Piping and Panning 99 



TWO SOULS 

Woman has two souls, declares Dr. G, Stanley Hall. 

A woman has two souls. The sage 
Has said it, and I half believe it; 

This solves the problem every age 
Has had to puzzle it and grieve it. 

One soul intent on heavenly things, 
The other bent on fiendish revel ; 

An angel, one, with snow white wings, 

The other — on a lower level. . \ 

Cu « LL- . ^ ■. ?.i nL flidfi St » L/ 

It is the one angelic soul 

That parts from me with tender yearning ; 
It is the other, black as coal, 

That nags me when I'm late returning. 
The one, when all my hopes fall flat, 

Cheers me with counsel sweet and brave — 
T'other, a minute after that, 

Hates me because I need a shave ! 

Two souls ! And when a woman dies, 

The two from one another sever — 
One goes to bliss beyond the skies. 

One to the brimstone lake forever ; 
And when her mate tastes death's dark cup, 

This justice do the gods allot him — 
Whether his soul goes down or up. 

No matter where he goes, she's got him ! 



lOO Piping and Panning 



SUNDRY REFLECTIONS 

I've often wished to write a shilling shock-tale 

Replete with parables and paradoxes, 
To teach what poison lurks within the cocktail, 

And in the little grapes that spoil the foxes ; 
'Twould be a lesson for the heedless many fit. 
And e'en the heedful few might get some benefit. 

I think I'd use, by way of illustration, 
The prehistoric fly that climbed the gum-tree, 

Tasting the sweetness of intoxication 

That oozes from a cherry tree or plum tree, 

And getting stuck, poor thing, in all that saccharine 

And gluey mess that trickles down to pack her in ! 

Vainly she struggles ! While her partner flaps his 
Free wings, she cannot fly or even clamber ; 

She wriggles, buzzes, gasps — and then collapses, 
Entombed for all eternity in amber ! 

There see the monument of her temerity 

A million generations of posterity! 

Oh, shun, dear child, all amber colored liquor, 
Especially when it is sweet and gummy ; 

Nothing will clog your brains and members quicker. 
And nothing's more upsetting to the tummy. 

Mankind will note your fate. Is this terrific cant? 

Ah ! But that insect's fate is sure significant ! 



Piping and Panning loi 



OLD STUFF 

" Life is real, life is earnest, 
And the grave is not the goal ; 

Dust thou art, to dust returnest. 
Was not spoken of the soul." 

Ribald tunes though we may troll, 

Rouse the lark from his (or her) nest — 

At the end and on the whole. 
Life is real, life is earnest. 

Though these handy hints thou spurnest, 
Man's a man, and not a mole ! 

Here's a game of all games sternest. 
And the grav6 is not its goal ! 

Though thou seekest either pole, 
This is what at last thou learnest — 

This thou payest for thy toll — 

" Dust thou art, to dust returnest ! " 

And as many a sea thou churnest. 
Plumb each deep and scrape each shoal, 

'Tis as if the wealth thou burnest 
Was not! (Spoken of the soul.) 

Busted is the Golden Bowl, 

Empty is the lined-with-fur nest! 

It's to laugh I Comme il est drolc ! 
Of all durn-fool jokes, the durnest 

Life is ! 



102 Piping and Panning 



A VAGARY 

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, 
Tell me, Mary, tell me true — 

Tom's a darling boy, but dare he, 
Merry Mary, marry you? 

Dick's a loving lad, but wary, 

And you'll find that timid, scary 
Harry, very wary, too. 

Mary, Mary, quite contrary. 
Tell me, Mary, tell me true — * 

Do you think such arbitrary 

Treatment of your beaux will do ? 

Think now — youth's but temporary; 

Lover's tempers often vary — 
Often long for something new. 

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, 
Tell me, Mary, tell me true — 

Do you court a solitary 

Life, who flout the lads that woo? 

Coyness may be necessary — 

Stubbornness is not. Be chary. 
Or you'll soon be wearing rue. 

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, 
Tell me, Mary, tell me true — 



Piping and Panning 103 

Have you found your strange vagary 
Satisfying through and through? 

Cut it out, you airy fairy ! 

(Here the rhyming dictionary 
Quits, or we'd hand out a few!) 



I04 Piping and Panning 



LIARS 

There was a girl who curled up on the lawn, 

Sniffed at a flower, and wrote a Uttle note; 
The tabouret was close beside her drawn. 

With caramels to soothe her as she wrote. 
A soft breeze fanned her alabaster brow, 

And happily she scribbled on and on — 
"O DarHng! Life is sad and dreary, now, 

And I am comfortless, when you are gone ! " 

That letter, mailed, came to a nice young man 

At eve, within his bachelor abode. 
And while his valet rushed the festive can, 

He smoked and lounged and got a gentle load ; 
And, as he loafed and sipped and smoked, somehow 

He wrote an answer to that note, ere dawn — 
" O sweetheart ! Life is cold and lonely, now, 

And I am comfortless, when you are gone ! " 

Yes, they are liars all, and so are we — 
But otherwise, how nasty life would be ! 



Piping and Panning 105 



A LAY OF ANCIENT ROME 

All in a quiet barnyard 

About the hour of ten, 
When biddies sleep without a peep 

And dream of colored men — 
A wraith in white there hove in sight — 

The Spirit of a Hen! 

The ghost of her who suffered 

The meanest kind of luck — 
(Of pip to die, though treated by 

The great quack. Doctor Duck). 
And in that roost the ghost produced 

A most sepulchral cluck ! 

Then the affrighted chickens 
Rushed screaming to and fro, 

With screech and squawk, as if a hawk 
At midnight had swooped low ; 

And all the fowls with dismal howls 
Did voice their frightened woe ! 

But see! amid the panic 

One noble soul is calm; 
She soothes the birds with quiet words, 

And then, without a qualm 
Strides toward that spook with stern rebuke. 

And exorcising psalm ! 



io6 Piping and Panning 

All honor to the chicken 
Who did so brave a thing! 

The ghastly shape, with beak agape 
And eyeballs glimmering, 

And baffled cry, away did fly 
On immaterial wing! 

And often in the twilight, 

When vain young pullets boast, 

Soma older hen quite shames them, when 
With just a gentle roast 

She tells of one ne'er since outdone — 
The Hen that Laid a Ghost ! 



Piping and Panning 107 



THE AGE OF GENIUS 

What is the age when Genius spreads its pinions 

And soars to heights beyond our mortal ken ? 
When rules the Muse her ultimate dominions ? 

(Muse of a tiny realm, make answer — when?) 
At fourteen, Chatterton had gained attention; 

At fifteen. Pope had published more or less; 
At sixteen, Byron got a deal of mention, 

At seventeen, John Dryden went to press. 

At eighteen, says tradition, David drops his 

Pebbles and sling, and smites the sacred lyre ; 
At nineteen, Bryant writes his Thanatopsis, 

At twenty, Shelley sets the world on fire. 
At twenty-one, come Horace, Heine, Schiller, 

Keats and Dumas, Disraeli and Voltaire; 
With lyric, drama and romantic thriller, 

And prose and poetry beyond compare. 

What boots it? Bunyan made his hit at fifty, 

And Dante did his stunt at fifty-one; 
Homer was sixty when he got his nifty 

And well known epic called " The Iliad " done. 
At seventy, De Morgan wrote his fiction, 

At eighty, Sara Bernhardt still will play. 
Thanks, Gentle Muse, for making no restriction — 

We're going to start our masterpiece today ! 



io8 Piping and Panning 



LIMITATIONS (1917) 

From battle I never should run, 

Though bullets flew hotter and hotter ; 
When charged by an enemy Hun, 

I should swat him a swat with my swatter. 

Before me the foeman would totter, 
If blessed with sufficient acumen: 

But please don't believe I'm a rotter — 
Remember, I'm nothing but human. 

I honestly can't see the fun 

In taxing an indigent cotter 
Like me an amount that would stun 

An owner of cars, or a yachter. 

I'd fight (if I could) as I'd otter 
For old Uncle Sam, like a true man — 

But why can't that supertax spotter 
Remember I'm nothing but human? 



I'd willingly shoulder a gun, 

And execute slacker and plotter. 
But why should I dig in the sun, 

And sweat like a clodhopping squatter? 

Let others in war gardens potter, 
I'll purchase my fats and albumen ; 

I won't be a darned vacant-lotter — 
Remember I'm nothing but human! 



Piping and Panning 109 



LENVOI 

I'd soak me in blood like a blotter, 
My love for my land to illumine ; 

But " Live and Let Live " is my motter — 
Remember, I'm nothing but human ! 



no Piping and Panning 



BUTTER AND EGGS 

" Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese " — 

That was the poet's burlesque refrain; 
I am concerned with but two of these, 

For cheeses my larder may still retain. 

All my breakfasts are tinged with pain, 
At dinner my spirit but dumbly begs 

For the presence bland of the vanished twain — 
Butter and eggs ! 

For lo ! 'Tis one of the firm decrees 

Of the household's head that we now abstain 
From the golden gobs of the dairy's lees. 

And the oval orbs of the hens' domain. 

Till the combination be crushed and slain. 
Till the speculators be jailed as yeggs, 

We've sworn to treat with a high disdain 
Butter and eggs ! 

I was never one that was hard to please 

And the strike is on, and I can't complain ; 
But at baked potatoes I choke and wheeze, 

And whole-wheat bread has an arid grain. 

We do it for principle, not for gain — 
Though our money was counted in bales and kegs. 

Though you offered them free, you would offer in 
vain 
Butter and eggs ! 



Piping and Panning iii 

(But list! When I'm loosed from the household's 
chain, 

Neath a lunch-room's table I stretch my legs ; 
Each noon I order — O joy profane! — 

"Butter and Eggs!") 



112 Piping and Panning 



A HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE 

A happy man is he who ne'er, 

While sleeping sound and safe from harm, 
Hears shrilling on the midnight air 

The sudden telephone's alarm ! 

An unknown terror strikes his heart 
Who in the midst of slumber deep 

Hears with a wild and painful start 
The jangling call that murders sleep. 

He fumbles vaguely at his waist 

To draw pa jama strings more snug — 

He leaps from bed in breathless haste, 
And sprawls across a lurking rug. 

His numbed brain struggles to invent, 
The while he rushes through the hall. 

The sort of grisly accident 

That could produce a midnight call, 

Adown the stair he holds his breath, 
While " Hurry — hurry ! " screams the bell ; 

He sees his mother cold in death, 
His brother in a felon's cell ! 

He whispers, huskily, " Hello ! " 

And quaking waits the words of fate; 

Then some brisk idiot answers, " Oh, 
Hello— is this the Nickel Plate?" 



Piping and Panning 113 

A wrong connection! Does it bring 
Welcome relief from all his fright? 

Ah, no ! He swears like anything, 
And can't get back to sleep all night ! 



114 Piping and Panning 



BALLADE OF A BACKSLIDER 

Darling, I am growing old! 

Yet, before I pass away, 
Shall these dimming eyes behold 

Woman hold her equal sway; 

I have labored for it — yea, 
I have racked this bulging dome 

To confute the men who say 
" Woman's place is in the Home." 



Darling, I am growing cold 

Toward the suflfrage hip-hooray; 
Silver threads among the gold 

Seem my fervor to allay. 

Just as dawns the longed-for day, 
Clear from Jacksonville to Nome, 

I am moved to murmur, " Nay, 
Woman's place is in the home ! " 

Darling, I am growing bold 

As my hair is growing gray ! 
You may sneer, or you may scold, 

But I fear no female fray ! 

When the ladies got too gay 
In the days of ancient Rome, 

Then began Rome's swift decay — 
Woman's place is in the Home. 



Piping and Panning 115 

(Princess, privately I pray 
You'll excuse this little pome ; 

Just in public, let me bray — 

" Woman's Place is in the Home ! ") 



ii6 Piping and Panning 



THE WRONG DOPE 

To greet the Dawn I rose to don 

My freshest raiment, thus to praise her. 

Betimes I shaved me — and anon 

Did deeply gash myself upon 
My safety razor. 

That first ill fortune started it — 

Some days are cursed, beyond a question !— 
My breakfast dish — the merest bit 
Of " Health Food "—handed me a fit 

Of indigestion! 

With but a moment's time to make 
My car, the haste that fear engenders 

Forced me a mighty leap to take; 

I won — but busted my Unbreak- 
Able Suspenders. 

My Hole Proof Sox that day wore through, 

My Rain Proof Shoes received a soaking ; 
My Dust Proof Watch was taken to 
The jeweler, who cleaned it. Do 
You think I'm joking? 

Ah no ! Too often dost thou trust 
To names — too tardy thou repentest ! 

Too oft, in agonized disgust, 

I've heard thee groan, as thou hast cussed 
The Painless Dentist ! 



Piping and Panning 117 

Next, my non-leaking fountain pen 

Broke loose and ruined all my raiment; 
The day wore on; the kindly men 
Whose Big Free Offer lured me, then 
Demanded payment. 

And thus from dawn to dark it ran, 

This tale of unexpected sorrow, 
Tonight I am a happy man, 
For, hap what may. Fate never can 

Act worse tomorrow! 



Ii8 Piping and Panning 



ROMANZA 

A sutler and a butler 

And a mirthless, worthless cutler- 

Oh, I say it with a sob! — 

They were hunting for a job. 
For the butler 

Couldn't buttle ; 
And the cutler 

Couldn't cuttle! 



But the sutler, he was subtler 
Than the cutler or the butler — 

Oh, I say it with a tear — 

He consoled himself with beer ! 
Though the fellow 

Couldn't suttle. 
He grew mellow 

On a scuttle! 



So the cutler and the butler 
Took example from the sutler — 

Oh, I say it with a sigh ! — 

They perceived that they were dry ; 
And they struggled 

For the scuttle. 
Which they juggled 

Like a shuttle ! 



Piping and Panning 119 

So the scuttle 

It was scuttled, 
And the shuttle 

All unshuttled, 
On the floor ! 

And the butler 

Never buttled, 
And the cutler 

Never cuttled, 
And the sutler 
(Who was subtler) 

Never suttled 
Any more! 



I20 Piping and Panning 



AN AMBITION (1917) 

It seems to me, if I could be a spiritistic medium, 
I'd palliate my present state of lassitude and tedium ; 
I wouldn't try for glory by performances sensational, 
My talents should be used for good — and purely educa- 
tional. 

If one should bruit an old dispute about some point 

in history, 
I'd raise his ghost who knew the most thereon, and 

end the mystery; 
Some bitter philosophic pill might puzzle us and 

stagger us — 
Swift to our aid I'd call the shade of Plato, or 

Pythagoras ! 

I'd call upon Napoleon for martial perspicacity, 
And then I'd bring to Gen'ral Byng the fruits of his 

sagacity ; 
The Iron Duke should send his spook to check the 

work of Bonaparte, 
And we should smash the Huns to hash, and rip the 

kaiser's throne apart! 

And every time my daily rhyme would be (as oft such 

jingles be) 
A task to write, I'd call the sprite of jolly old Tom 

Ingoldsby ; 



Piping and Panning 121 

I'd pill my faith to Gilbert's wraith to make my dittieS 

trillable, 
And Keats himself, the soulful elf, should smooth 

each halting syllable! 

Alackaday! Although I pray for power that seems 
so common, ah ! 

I never once could do the stunts of psychical phe- 
nomena ! 

No ghostly chap will give a rap for me — no soul 
ethereal 

Will boost my game, or bring me fame, or anything 
material ! 



122 Piping and Panning 



THE OLD LOVE 

The ghost of a dead sweetheart came, last night, 
And sat beside me in the tent of sleep; 
And my heart met her with a joyful leap, 

And knew not that the years had taken flight. 

Each word was so familiar that it might 
Have been but yesterday I woke to weep 
The death of those first joys no man can keep— 

The passing of the days of pure delight ! 

Each tone, each gesture, had the well-known grace 
I loved so well, of old; her tenderness 

Was round me as I woke, and found her place 
Empty, and lost the ghost of a caress. 

But in the darkness she had veiled her face. 
And which old love she was, I cannot guess ! 



Piping and Panning 123 



" THE USES OF ADVERSITY " 

He finished early on that afternoon, by lucky 

chance, 
And when he hurried home, he bore some fine tomato 

plants ; 
He rushed out to his garden, lest the plants should 

droop and spoil, 
And quickly socked them down into the unproductive 

soil! 



His garden was a hillside, and his soil was gummy 
clay 

And when he sank that dozen plants, they wilted 
right away ! 

And then he went and called his wife, and said, " Go 
get a pail. 

And pour some water on them plants, and do it with- 
out fail ! " 



She went and took some water that the house could 

ill afford. 
She stood above that garden patch and poured and 

poured and poured. 
The water ran right past the plants and settled down 

below 
And made the weeds and pusley and mosquito breeders 

grow ! 



124 Piping and Panning 

The more she'd pour, the less the slippery soil would 

seem to sup ! 
The more she'd pour, so much the more the burdocks 

swallered up ! 
Her arms got sore, but still she'd pour — the plants 

would droop and die, 
But as she poured the plantains soared, and the grass 

grew ten feet high! 

They never plucked tomatoes from the garden on the 

hill ; 
But from the swamp below that happy family got its 

fill! 
For there the wild duck nested — and we dined upon 

her eggs! 
And there the bullfrog rested — and we supped upon 

his legs! 



Piping and Panning 125 



CONSERVATIVES 

The queerest class of people I'm privileged to know 
Are those who always cry out " Stop ! " and never cry 

out " Go ! "— 
The height of whose ambition is to keep the status quo. 



" Quieta non movere " is the motto that they bear ; 
That Well Enough be let alone is their sincerest prayer, 
And all of their religion is the creed of laissez-faire. 

The sound of their own footsteps gives a most un- 
pleasant thrill, 
No matter if upon a plain they march, or up a hill — 
And so they hush the dreadful sound by merely 
standing still. 

Dying and letting die, they call " living and letting 
live"; 

They do not even make mistakes for live ones to for- 
give; 

Wouldst thou be Nothing? Then, my son, be a Con- 
servative ! 



126 Piping and Panning 



WHAT HAPPENED 

There in the dark, my nerves were all a-tingle ; 
Sleep would not come. The night-sounds seemed to 
mingle 

Into a roar, 
I was alone, and in a country tavern ; 
The room was black — it might have been a cavern 

Sans roof or floor. 

Something unknown, in grim amorphous starkness. 
Threatened and menaced there amid the darkness, 

And worried me ; 
There was some Thing, or Things without a number, 
Voicelessly calling, keeping me from slumber — 

Some mystery. 

Hours seemed to pass — my brain was busy, seething, 
Dreaming awake, or frightened by my breathing — 

Suddenly, lo. 
My skin crept, and with a piercing anguish smitten, 
I leapt from bed as if I had been bitten — 

(And I had, you know!) 



Piping and Panning 127 



THOUGHTS INSPIRED BY AN ORGAN 
GRINDER'S MONKEY 

Begging pence, though clothed in scarlet, 

Tiny simian medicant ! 
Shall I pity thee, poor varlet? 

No — upon the whole, I shan't; 
False as is the gilt bedizened 

In thy epaulets and lace. 
False the pathos in thy wizened 

Little face. 

Once, when I was young (I'm turning 

Often to that finished page, 
Though I'm told that such a yearning 

Is certain sign of age!) 
Knowing where the masters sailed from 

Of the monkeys known to me, 
I believed that monkeys hailed from 

Napoli. 

So that even now, dear Jocko, 

When I see a monkey troupe. 
Though I know they're from Morocco, 

Mozambique or Guadaloupe, 
I address the monks I gaze at, 

Thinking that they'll understand. 
With the sole Italian phrase at 

Mv command. 



128 Piping and Panning 

I have wandered from my thesis 

In my old, unlucky way — 
Now I wonder what the piece is 

That I started out to say? 
Never mind — I've come a cropper — 

When I'm down I can't get up ; 

Doff your hat, Jock — here's a copper 

For your cup! 



Piping and Panning 129 



THE TRUTH OF IT 

" One for the money, 
Two for the show ; 
Three to make ready, 
And four to go ! " 
> 

Think of the rhyme, as you're working, dear neighbor ; 

Whether your job's to be sober or funny. 
Never forget you're expending your labor 

(1) For the money. 

Grab it, hold on to it, dig it and delve it — 

Then very soon you will have some to blow; 
Then you'll be glad you've gone south with some 
velvet, 

(2) For the Show. 

Toil and amusement are half your existence; 
Then comes the time when you'll have to hold 
steady — 
Something you'll need, with Old Age in the distance, 

(3) To make ready! 

That's all you want. If you still keep your senses, 

Age is no burden and death is no foe. 
Hold out a bit for your burial expenses, 

And (4) to go ! 



130 Piping and Panning 



THE AVERAGE MAN 

I'm just as well and hearty as it's possible to be; 

There's not a fellow of my age that's healthier than me. 

I'm strong and sound in wind and limb, I have an 
appetite 

That anyone might envy, and I sleep well every night. 

I smoke, of course, and drink a little, do not exercise, 

And read in bed, which doctors say is hard upon the 
eyes ; 

But doctors don't know everything, it frequently ap- 
pears — 

Just look at me — as well and strong as one of half 
my years ! 

I find that smoking calms my nerves — they're always 

on the blink 
The morning after I have had a bit too much to 

drink ; 
I find that drinking steadies me — and I'm in need of 

such 
The morning after I have smoked a little bit too much ; 
The doctor says I should play golf — I can't persuade 

the chap 
That one who eats as much as I should have his daily 

nap; 
He makes a lot of fuss about my little trifling ills. 
Which I can always regulate with Bunkem's Liver 

Pills. 



Piping and Panning 131 

These fits of indigestion some fine day will take me 

off— 
To hear him talk ! He frowns about this little chronic 

cough ; 
He says my headache medicine has lurking danger 

in it — 
Then let him make a better one — this cures me in a 

minute ! 
A lot the doctors know ! My partner died last Satur- 
day, 
And no one thought him very sick, till he had passed 

away. 
Some hidden weakness I suppose it was — but, anyhow. 
If he'd been careful of himself, like me, he'd be here 

now! 



132 Piping and Panning 



SAD SEPTEMBER SENTIMENTS 

One of the days when one's a martyr 
To circumstance today is mine ; 

I've broke a shoe lace and a garter, 
A cuff link and a date to dine. 

Against the pane the rain drops patter, 
And all the birds have ceased to sing ; 

There's something horribly the matter 
With everything! 



The autumn winds are sadly sighing. 

The wet turf smells like churchyard mold ! 

The teardrops start, for Summer's dying, 
And I'm afraid I've taken cold. 

My heart is stirred with apprehension. 
And sleeping sorrows start awake. 

And that old tooth that needs attention 
Begins to ache ! 

The eaves in dreary anguish dripping, 
Weep, too, like sympathetic souls — 

Alas ! Five mornings without skipping, 
I've found my socks all full of holes ; 

I suffer dumbly — not abusive 

Am I, though all the house goes wrong ; 

Such lapses, though, are not conducive 
To lyric song. 



Piping and Panning 133 

Though fast were drawn each shade and curtain, 
And fires were ht, the gloom to hide, 

Still would my weary heart be certain 
That rain was reigning there outside; 

Bleak land, with leaden clouds above it — 
Cold, sodden nights and drizzling morns ; 

My sobbing soul would tell me of it — 
Also my corns! 

Enough! Perhaps I should remember 
That e'en the worst of luck must mend ; 

A few more days, and then September 
With all its bitterness will end. 

I'm not yet blind — I still am goutless — 
I still can grind my daily verse. 

Now comes October (which will doubtless 
Be even worse!) 



134 Piping and Panning 



BEING INSPIRED 

One, thinking of his love, composed a rhyme 
Inspired and wonderful — all people said 

'Twas so. He tried again, time after time, 
But found his inspiration cold and dead. 

Another drank of wine, and as he drank 
His heated brain conceived a poem new ; 

He tried again — and the result was rank; 
The muse, insulted, smelt the trick and flew ! 

One played with opium and had a dream 

That came no more. One read till he was full 

Of classical Nepenthe — gushed one stream 
Of genius — " much cry, and but little wool ! " 

All won their prizes. Then a clean man rose. 
Unloved, undoped — just normal. And he tried 

Horse-sense — and half the world cried " What a 
pose ! " 
The other half, " How vulgar ! " He too, died. 



Piping and Panning 135 



REFLECTIONS 

This is the end of all our toil — 

To gain some sweetness, e'en from tears; 
To wring some pleasure from the soil, 

Ere Death, the Harvester, appears. 

Our hopes, our loves, our doubts, our fears, 
Whatever else we may pretend, 

Shrink from the doom each mortal hears — 
" This is the end ! " 



This is the end of all turmoil — 

To reach, at last, some quiet years ; 
And yet we ever seek to foil 

That Greatest Resting, when it nears. 

Only at times our vision clears — 
We see Death as a kindly friend. 

And hear at last, with eager ears, 
"This is the end!" 



Let's shuffle off this mortal coil 

With grace, and pay our life's arrears. 
Let's play the game by rules of Hoyle, 

Whether we win or lose the beers ; 

Giving no fellow man bum steers, 
Nor welching when it's time to spend. 

But laughing, when some knocker sneers, 
" This is the end ! " 



136 Piping and Panning 

(This is the end. Let's give three cheers. 

How do you like this sort of blend 
Of platitudes? Ah, spare your jeers — 
This is 



THE END.) 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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